Published 11:19 am, Wednesday, June 28, 2017

STRATFORD >> Ethics commissioner Dr. Noel Kayo has an ethics dilemma of his own after police said they busted him outside a hotel here for mistaking a local woman for the prostitute he had ordered online.

“I will not resign,” the 39-year-old cardiovascular researcher and member of the Bridgeport Ethics Commission, proclaimed Tuesday after it became public that he was charged Monday with patronizing a prostitute.

He is free on a promise to appear pending arraignment in Superior Court in Bridgeport on July 7.

Police said on Monday they were called to The Quality Suites on South Avenue for a disturbance. When officers arrived at the hotel parking lot, police said they found 20-year-old Linda Pena and her boyfriend, 19-year-old Tyler Purcell, both of Watkins Street, trying to wash pepper spray out of Kayo’s eyes.

Kayo told officers he had answered an advertisement on the website Backpage.com for a “petite shy Latina new to the area,” and arranged to meet the woman outside the hotel for a “massage and happy ending,” police said.

Police said when Kayo saw Pena standing outside the hotel he just assumed she was the shy Latina he was there to meet.

But police said Pena told them she had not contacted Kayo. They said she told them that she had previously agreed to pose nude for a photographer in New York in exchange for money she and her boyfriend were going to use to move to a better apartment.

Police said Pena told them the photographer arranged to have one of his associates meet her at the hotel to give her the money. When she saw Kayo pull up she thought he was the associate with the money.

Police said Pena got into Kayo’s car and immediately demanded her money but Kayo repeatedly argued that he wanted his services first.

Pena, afraid that Kayo was going to sexually assault her, pulled out her pepper spray canister and shot him in the face, police said. They said Purcell, who was waiting nearby, believed his girlfriend was in danger and ran to the car and shot Kayo in the face with his own pepper spray canister, police said.

Pena and Purcell were both charged with third-degree assault and released on written promises to appear in court.

Kayo, a graduate of St. Matthew’s University Medical School in Grand Cayman, was appointed to the ethics commission in August. The seven-member commission is to investigate complaints made against city officials and city employees suspected of using their public positions for personal or financial gain.

During his interview for the commission before the city council, Kayo said that Democratic Town Chairman Mario Testa had recommended he apply for the position, telling him what the ethics commission was about.

Reached by telephone Tuesday, Kayo denied that he was trying to pick up a prostitute and instead claimed he was the victim of an attempted robbery by Pena and Purcell.

“Yesterday I met a young female who said she lost her wallet and wanted a ride,” he told Hearst Connecticut Media. “Somebody came up behind me and sprayed me with pepper spray and then the guy tried to steal my wallet and I called police.

Kayo, who said he still has trouble seeing because of the pepper spray, said he intends to argue his case when he comes before a judge.

“I was a good Samaritan trying to help this young lady and it turned out to be a setup to have her friend rob me,” Kayo said. “If you can’t help someone in distress and they use your good intentions to try and rob you, what kind of world is this?”